The Story of Rhys--The Set-Up

Through a series of events and spiritual directions, we ended up deciding to leave the state (Washington) to have a midwife-attended homebirth for our second child. We considered several options for our away-from-home-homebirth, but settled on Utah because I have so many family members and friends there, including a friend who had had a homebirth already and could put me in touch with midwives in the area. It is very strange interviewing midwives long-distance knowing you won’t be able to actually meet them until probably too late to change your mind, but I persevered, and I know that I was supported by the Lord in the choice I made.

The baby was due in the end of January, so we determined to travel to Utah right after New Years and stay with various relatives and friends as we waited for and welcomed our new baby. My husband’s work being what it is (away from home for a couple of weeks or a couple of months at a time and then home with no work at all for about the same), we simply requested the months of January and February off. It worked out really well, because winter is the slow season in his field, anyway.

The midwife we had chosen lives in Spanish Fork, UT. The relatives we were going to stay with live in Stansbury Park and Sandy, 90 minutes and 60 minutes from Spanish Fork, respectively. We decided to actually birth the baby at the home of the friend who had already had a homebirth and who had put me in touch with the midwife in the first place. The reason for this decision was very simple—she had invited us. It is a very awkward situation to try to figure out who you can go to and ask, “Can I have my baby at your house?”

Though I love my sister dearly, I have never been close to her before, due to the logistics of age and distance—she is about 16 years older and has lived in a different state for most of my life. Her husband is also a very reserved person, so I have know him even less well. I really had no idea how they would react to the suggestion. Looking back on it now, it doesn’t seem that awkward anymore, but that may be due largely to how much better acquainted and more comfortable I have been with them since staying with them for several weeks and also the fact that I am not a raging torrent of pregnancy hormones right now (at least, I have no physical proof that I am. That doesn’t stop my mind from finding every possible reason to believe I am, but I’m not allowed to acknowledge that).

I think I would have felt comfortable asking my mom if I could have the baby at her house, but I didn’t think it would go over so well with the condominium board of their retirement complex.

My friend, however, probably didn’t know what she was getting herself into when I called her up to ask about midwives in the area and she said, “You should come have your baby at my house!” because she was also pregnant—and due the day before I was, in addition to having a nearly 2-year-old of their own in a house too small for them already. However, it was an offer, and I called her up to make sure she was serious. She was, and so generous, and so we headed to Utah. After we got there, however, another friend of ours who lived in Salt Lake City offered to let us come to their house to have the baby because they had more room (we could have the whole downstairs to ourselves!) and although she was also pregnant, she wasn’t due for 2 more months. We discussed it and prayed about it, and took the offer. Though it was further from our midwife, it was closer to where we were staying, and I was very glad to remove the burden from our friend with so much less space and so very pregnant herself who probably really didn’t know what she was doing when she invited us to come.

The Story of Rhys--The Build-Up

The midwife, at our first meeting, lent me a book (which I very highly recommend) entitled Birthing from Within. Like Ina Mae’s Guide to Childbirth that I read when expecting my daughter, it is also very empowering, but went beyond “natural childbirth is a wonderful and awesome and doable thing” to actually walking you through ways you can prepare yourself, mentally and psychologically, because when it comes down to it, there’s not much you can do to prepare physically. It suggested ways to explore and discover what you really think and believe about childbirth and to work through and get over anxieties or hang-ups that you may have. One thing that the author said that I had never thought about before was that the mothers who absolutely do not worry at all are the most likely to have problems. She said that that was her at her own first birthing experience, and that things ended up going horribly for her, at least emotionally, and I realized that that was me, as well. I had been so calmly confident before my daughter’s birth that I hadn’t seriously thought through divergent scenarios, especially not that it may eventually end with a C-section. Consequently, when something didn’t go exactly as I had envisioned it, I was left with nothing to guide myself or my choices, so the choices that were made were not necessarily the best. I realized that while I had changed the circumstances under which I was going to birth this time, I still had not done anything to prepare myself for the possibilities that still existed for this birth.

I think the biggest reality that I finally acknowledged was that it might get to a point that I couldn’t handle it. That probably sounds really dumb. Of course it would get to a point where I couldn’t handle it. Isn’t that a given with childbirth? But I clung so firmly to the memory that I didn’t start to have trouble with the pain of labor while I was birthing my daughter until after they told me it wasn’t working. I was absolutely certain that it was the despair that made the pain unbearable. I finally made myself face the possibility that the pain might actually just get to be that bad—so bad that I wanted to cry and run away and stop being relaxed. I had to decide what I would do if—when—it got to that point. It probably doesn’t seem like much, but it was very powerful to me to make the decision that even when all of my techniques stopped “working” and the pain was more than I thought I could bear, that I would just keep going anyway. I was able to face the eventuality that it would hurt as bad as it had with my daughter, and worse, and that was OK, and I would keep doing it. I actually built a beautiful little image in my mind of Heavenly Father sitting behind me with his arms wrapped around me and me so exhausted I couldn’t go on, leaning back into him and his hands pushing through me to get the baby out.

I really didn’t know what to expect by way of timing. I was geared up for a long wait with my first pregnancy, and I went into labor on my due date. I still vaguely expected a long wait with this one, or at least I wanted to be psychologically prepared for one so I wouldn’t get too anxious if he was later than his due date. We hadn’t been in Utah a week, and were still more than 2 weeks before his due date when one Saturday morning I was sitting at the computer and was suddenly seized by a very intense, nearly painful contraction. It was so unexpected that it took my breath away. It was a bit shocking, because, as I explained in the story of my first birth, I never noticed before a difference between Braxton Hicks-pre-labor contractions and the real thing when I was in labor. The labor contractions got more intense than the pre-labor ever did, but it was a perfect continuum of progression. There was never a point when I “knew” that they were the real thing, as opposed to all those “false” ones I had before. However, this time, I knew. This was the real thing. One difference was that the Braxton-Hicks contractions I had felt all along (just like the early labor contractions the first time) were almost entirely in the front, and started at the top. This one went all the way around the middle and dug little fingers of discomfort into my lower back.

However, there was only one. I noted the time, but no more came that day. The next day, while sitting in Relief Society at church, I had another one, all of a sudden. This was followed by another, about 20 minutes later. It is very difficult to concentrate on the lesson when you are trying to listen to your body and are getting excited about a new baby coming, possibly right now. But they also stopped. I spent the next two weeks like that—two or three very intense contractions in a row every day or two, but they always stopped. I wouldn’t have minded so much except that they were so tiring. If I was having the baby, I would have been OK with putting everything else aside and just concentrating on this birth, but as it was, life was going on and I had a 2 year old to take care of.

With my first pregnancy, my 3rd trimester was my most comfortable one. I felt slightly nauseated during the entire first trimester, and the second was dominated by my inability to find a good position to sleep in, so my hips ached constantly. By the third trimester, my body had sort of grown into itself, and I was sleeping just fine again. I wasn’t overly tired, I didn’t ache or swell, I wasn’t too hot (it was Winter), and I enjoyed eating. I was doing great! So I couldn’t empathize with women who were so “done” by the end of their 7th or 8th month that they would beg to be induced early.

But this time was different. I was getting worn out. I knew that if I had to live like this for more than a week or two, I might seriously reconsider my position against elective inductions. I didn’t really think that I would opt for one myself, but I felt a lot less self righteous about people who did.

The Story of Rhys--The Beginning

I was having regular appointments with my midwife about once a week.
On the Friday 5 days before my due date my family was having a get-together about 3 hours away for my 95 year-old grandfather’s birthday. I wanted to go, but was a little leery of spending the night so far away from my midwife. I prayed really hard that if anything was going to be wrong, I would be prompted not to go. With how slowly my first labor progressed, I was pretty sure I would have at least 3 hours warning before the baby was born this time, so we decided to go and come back early the next morning. We wanted to stay until the evening, when the birthday party was going to be, but we figured the less time spent away from the midwife the better, and there was also a “comfort measures” birth class the Saturday that I really wanted my husband to go to with me.
Saturday morning we had just gotten in the car (around 7:00 am) to drive back when I started having contractions. They were not as intense as the first one I had had more than a week earlier, but they were definitely not Braxton-Hicks. They kept coming every 4-7 minutes, and as I had nothing better to do on this ride, I keep meticulous notes. As meticulous as I was, however, I wasn’t necessarily accurate, because I didn’t have a second hand to consult, only the minutes on the digital clock.

We went straight to the house of another midwife where the birth class was being held. It was interesting and informative, but I was extremely distracted, and secretly feeling smug as I noted and breathed deeply through each contraction, about every 5 minutes throughout the entire meeting. At the end of the meeting, around 2:30 pm, I had already scheduled a regular appointment with my midwife, which we had there at the other midwife’s house. I had been trying to manage my mounting excitement but secretly growing ever more confident that this would be the day, maybe only an hour or two away to a new baby! So I was very disappointed when the midwife found I was only 1 cm. dilated and that, though close together, the contractions themselves weren’t long enough to signify imminent birth or even expeditious progress. However they were consistent and they weren’t going away, so it looked we were definitely on our way.

I was sent home with the instruction to keep an eye on things and call the midwife when they got to be 45 seconds long. I told myself that was OK, since I wasn’t actually ready yet. I didn’t have anything packed up to take to the house where the baby would be born, there were still some grocery things I wanted to get, and, Oh no! I just remembered I still didn’t have anything to wear during labor. I had been planning all along to get some big nightshirts or something, because nothing I had already would keep me cool and covered. It was early afternoon as we headed home (to my mom’s condo) and I knew my toddler needed a nap, which meant someone had to be home with her. My parents weren’t back from grandad’s yet and I knew I couldn’t just send my husband out to get the things I needed, because he couldn’t try on night shirts for me and I didn’t want to have to justify to him why I wanted cranberry juice and Twix bars and yogurt and pineapple juice and granola. Besides, he was pretty tired from our late night and early morning, and who knew when he would get to sleep next.

The Story of Rhys--The Stupidity

So I dropped off my family at the condo and headed out by myself to try to find what I was looking for. I have since decided that every laboring mother needs an experienced consultant with veto power over stupid decisions during her early labor.

I knew my way to the mall and to the grocery store, but I didn’t know much more than that about the city I was in. I thought I remembered passing a thrift store at some point, so I first drove up and down most of the streets between where I was and the freeway—every place I had driven before. I had no luck, but it ended me right by the mall, so I went in to check what was there. By the time I finished scanning every department store in the mall, utterly failing to find anything that would suit my needs, I was walking very quickly and pausing about every 20 steps to lean over and breathe through a contraction. In this manner I made it to the information desk, where I employed the phone book there to locate the only thrift store in the city—no where near where I had been looking. I made my hurried and halting way back to the car and took off again. At the thrift store I pawed through the racks of sleepwear, certain there had to be something to meet my needs—knee length, short sleeved, knit material, with several inches of buttons down the front. I finally found one that fit the description, but I was extremely turned off by the fact that it was designed to look like a baseball jersey. Not being even remotely close to any sort of ball fan, I started to put it back when I noticed the name scrawled across the front and suddenly my whole opinion of the shirt changed. It just said “Home Team,” and I knew I had found the perfect shirt to welcome my home-birthed baby into the world. I kept looking and found 2 more that were OK and purchased them along with an impulse grab of the original Land Before Time movie, even though we already have a copy, I just like it so much better than even the idea of any of the ones that come after, I just wanted to be sure it found a good home. It made perfect sense in my befuddled labor brain.

Just across the street from the thrift store was a dollar store, whither I went to find a cheap watch to time the contractions. I also got several packages of cheap candy and a doll outfit that looked like it would just fit my daughter’s hand-me-down dolly that currently only had a shirt. By this time I wasn’t just standing still and breathing hard during the contractions, but was losing focus on what was going on around me. But I climbed back into the car and drove myself to the grocery store. I ran in and did what I usually do—convince myself that it is just going to be really quick and I only have a few items so I only need a hand basket, not a whole cart. This was double dunce of me because carrying anything during contractions is stupid, but I also forgot to note that the first thing I was putting in my basket was 3 quarts (6 lbs) of juice. It only got heavier from there. By the time I finished, the basket was overflowing and I had to stop and set it down every few steps to breath heavy, lean forward and concentrate through a contraction. At the check-out counter I let them load it all into a cart for me to take out to the car. I even let someone help me take it out and load it in. By this time the contractions were taking some concentration and were coming quicker than every 5 minutes. Then I did something I, in retro-spect, would never let anyone in my condition do and climbed back into the car to drive myself the 6 blocks home. I had 3 or 4 contractions just going that distance and it took all my concentration not to ease my foot off the gas, close my eyes and turn inward during them. I had to actively force myself to look at the road and pay attention to my surroundings. It was extremely uncomfortable and extremely unsafe. Never again.

I got back to the condo around 7 or 8 pm, a full 12 hours into labor, and my husband helped me unload the car. I was anxious to have everything ready to head out to the birth house when it was time, but he convinced me to relax and focus more on getting some sleep first, since I didn’t know how soon that would become impossible. I set my new watch and timed a few contractions, just to see. Although definitely more intense, they were still only about 25-35 seconds long. So I got undressed and laid down in bed and dozed off. I don’t know how often I woke up, or how soundly I slept, but I do know that around 3:30 or 4 am I got tired of pretending to sleep when I was really just worried about not having a bag packed. So I got up and gathered a few things, then sat down with the stop watch. It was then I found the contractions were about 45 seconds long, so I woke up my husband and called the midwife. We finished gathering everything else that I wanted, woke my parents, called the people whose house we would be going to, and headed out.

The Story of Rhys--The Progress

We got to the house where I would give birth at about 5:30 am, with 22 hours of labor already under my belt, and unpacked some of our stuff in the downstairs bedroom. I think I tried to go back to sleep while we waited for the midwife. I have a copy of the labor record, so from this point I don’t have to rely on my memory for times, which is good, because I didn’t pay much attention to numbers on the clock, just how awfully many times the minute hand went around. At about 7:00 am the midwife arrived. I really hoped things would go fast to justify calling her there that morning rather than later in the afternoon because it was Sunday and her oldest daughter was giving her first talk in sacrament meeting that day, and my lovely angel midwife was missing it to be with me. She checked me, and again to my dismay, I was still only 1 cm. However, she did examine me through a contraction and said that during the contraction I stretched to 3 cm, then went back to 1 when it was over. She was very positive about it and I was very grateful, but I was mentally trying to tally how long it would take at that rate to finally get to 10. I labored all morning and I started feeling the contractions in my back strong enough that I wrapped large hot packs wrapped around my middle and asked my husband to put counter-pressure on my low back during the contractions. I did a lot of contractions kneeling at the bedside. I discovered that I like to labor very vocally. I don’t shout or get mad, I just bellow, very loudly, during contractions. I tried to keep my mouth as soft and loose as possible, just as I wanted the rest of me to stay soft and loose and get softer and looser. I was actually very worried that I might do anything to prolong the dilating process or stall it as it had stalled with my first labor, so I worked a lot on positive imagery of being open and relaxed and kept my lips and jaw hanging loose.

I found that sitting was the absolutely most excruciatingly uncomfortable thing I could do during a contraction. Because of the pain in my back the contractions caused, anything pushing my hip bones up into that area intensified the sensation unbearably. This was most noticed while going to the bathroom, which I couldn’t do without having at least one contraction while sitting on the toilet. I would stand up and pulse up and down in a sort of squat until it passed, then finish. Likewise I would have a contraction while I was leaning at the sink with my hands under the water to wash them and have to pause and bounce through that one (next time—hand sanitizer!). Then I would have at least one more on my way back to the bedroom (literally 3 steps between the doors) and I would lean against the door jam and sway. This got to be very tedious, as I went to the bathroom probably at least once an hour.

I wanted to try laboring in water, so in the late morning my husband and the midwife brought in a tub (actually an extra large horse trough used only for the purpose) and set it up in the next room. They lined it with blankets then painter’s plastic and filled it with warm water. The midwife explained that the tub was ready, but they didn’t want me to get in it until I was at least 6 cm because if the labor hasn’t progressed far enough, relaxing in a hot tub can actually slow it down rather than help it along. I was pretty put out by that, knowing it had only been about 4 hours since I was 1 cm plus some stretch, and it had taken me about 24 hours to get to that point. She examined me and I asked “one and a half?” “Oh, give yourself more credit than that!” she said. I guessed, “3 cm?” And she said, “Try 6 cm.” I couldn’t believe it. Was that really possible? I was so excited. I changed out of my nightshirt and climbed into the tub. As I was lowering myself in I felt a contraction starting, so I turned over onto my hands and knees and as I did so, I felt a sensation like a large balloon or bubble suddenly expand from my vagina and burst with a gush. At the same time they (my husband and the midwife) noticed a plume of color in the water. My water had broken.

There was meconium in the fluid, but as the baby’s heart beat was still steady and strong, and there were no other signs of distress, the midwife wasn’t concerned. The baby’s heart rate was measured periodically with a hand-held Doppler that could be used in or out of the water. It was very convenient for me and I felt very confident that we were being looked after and monitored safely. I don’t remember how long I stayed in the tub, but I found it wasn’t quite perfect for me—the shape of the trough was pinched in at the middle so there wasn’t a good way for me to kneel and spread my knees wide, which was the position I felt most comfortable in during contractions that kept me in the water (as opposed to standing)—so I found myself getting annoyed with it. I got out at about 1 pm, 30 hours into labor. I had dilated to 8 cm, but had an anterior lip of cervix that was still impeding the baby’s head. I was very excited at the great progress I was making.

The Story of Rhys--The Long Haul

The next 12 hours were, I think, the longest of my life. Around 5 pm (34 hours) I was still 8 cm, but the lip was more pliable. Around 8 pm (37 hours) I was 8+ cm, stretching to 9 during a contraction. My angel midwife was so encouraging. After checking me each time, she would tell me the progression from the last time. Even if it was only that it felt softer than before, she never once told me there had been no progress. As wonderful as she was, I was getting exhausted, and the contractions were getting more painful. She had called 2 other midwife friends, as she usually does, to assist her. I don’t know what time the first showed up, but I remember her bringing a renewed vigor into the room. She had ideas of things that might help the labor along and I got up and walked up and down the stairs numerous times. I drank chicken broth and juice and water and nibbled some other snacks. I can’t remember what they were, except the Rolos. I wasn’t able to get Twix, so I had a dish of individually wrapped Rolos. Periodically I would grab two, unwrap one, pop it in my mouth, and before I could get the other one unwrapped, another contraction would start. Every. Single. Time. And yet I continued to grab two Rolos at a time because that was how many I wanted to eat. And I continued to be interrupted by contractions. That was what got the most frustrating and exhausting, how short the respite between the contractions was. I don’t actually know, because we didn’t time the contractions or record them, but I don’t think I got more than 3 minutes between any of them since I got out of the tub.

I remember through the night laying in the bed praying to have a few minutes, just a few minutes—long enough to actually fall asleep—before the next contraction and never once getting it. Every time I would just begin to relax into the bed another one would hit and the pain would force me to get up and roll off the side of the bed onto my knees on the floor. My husband and midwife applied so much counter-pressure so often to alleviate the pain of contractions in my low back that I began to feel like the entire area was a bruise. Even though the contraction pain was slightly lessened by the pressure, the addition of the bruisy feeling on top of the remaining pain became unbearable, and I asked them to stop pushing on my back during contractions. It was about at this point, I think, that my husband was sort of left without anything at all to do. That had been his one constant job—to push on my back during contractions—and he did it very faithfully. But now I couldn’t stand it, and I couldn’t think of anything else for him to do, so I think I mostly ignored him. Except when I was trying to beg some sleep, he would spoon behind me in the bed. I liked that, but it never lasted long enough to even seem like it was helping.

At some point during then night—I can’t remember the order of the final events, I got in the tub again. It didn’t last very long before I got too annoyed with it, again, and I was out. Roxanna had me try putting one foot up on the edge of the tub (about 2 ½-3 feet high) and squatting during contractions. I could only make it through 1 ½ like that, it hurt way too much. My entire thought process during contractions by this point was reduced to “How can I make this less? How can I lessen this pain so I can stand it? I can’t stand it!” I thought frequently about an epidural. I wondered if I was in the hospital if I would have the willpower or the desire not to ask for one. I really didn’t know. The only thing I did know was that there was no way (aside from a medical emergency) that I would voluntarily submit to a car ride in that condition to get me to the hospital where I could have one. So I was stuck dealing with it on my own.

I prayed so hard for the pain to be taken away. I invoked the power of my faith, and I had no doubt that it was possible for God to remove physical sensations from my body. I prayed, I pleaded, and I begged. Didn’t Christ already suffer everything? Wasn’t that the point of the Atonement? Aren’t we not supposed to be required to suffer if we have faith? Please! Please. Take this pain away. Take it away! Take it away! I would cry through my contractions, and the only thing that kept me from sobs was the fear that any tensing of my body in any way would prolong the experience. I remember resting between contractions and praying for respite, for a few minutes, a little rest, just a little break and then feeling the next one start to come and my voice would burst from my body, “Nnnnnnnoooo…” and then I would catch myself, unwilling to give in to any negative energy during a contraction and quickly start saying, “Yeeeeeeeeeeees, Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeees,” as low and open as I could make it.

The Story of Rhys--The Higher Plain

Finally, after hours of pleading, I began to realize that perhaps this pain wasn’t going to go away. Perhaps, for whatever reason He may have, the Lord wanted, needed me to bear it. Finally, I stopped pleading for it to be taken away and started praying for strength to be equal to what He was asking of me. It was at this point, after more than a full day and a half of labor, that began the most beautiful and sacred emotional experiences of my childbirth. I truly believe that I could not have had them if I had not been pushed to the utter extremity of my emotional endurance. Obviously it was not the extremity of my physical endurance (thanks to the endless energy from all the Rolos) because I continued on for several hours more, but it was the end of my conscious ability to deal with it.

As this mindshift came and I gave myself up to whatever the Lord had in store for me, no matter what it was, I saw in it the Savior’s pleading in the garden, “Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from me; nevertheless, not my will, but Thine be done.” (Luke 22:42). I wonder how long he actually begged “remove this cup” before he said, “nevertheless.” It took me hours to get to my “nevertheless” moment. After that, the contractions were still as utterly excruciating and exhausting. I can’t remember feeling physically any different at all. But even in my utter fatigue, I had an increased measure of peace. I was carried along without feeling any need to control—at least beyond the innate and inexorable physical urge to create the position of least pain during contractions. My emotional struggles were gone. I did not feel abandoned. I did not feel like I was lacking in faith. I just felt exhausted. I was confident that the fatigue would not kill me, and beyond that, I could make it through anything else. I was able to live in the moment, the horrific and torturous moment, but just moment by moment nonetheless.

I think the most profound parallel to the Atonement that impressed itself upon me was not just suffering, but suffering for the sake of another. At the moment I finally said, “I will drink this bitter cup. I recognize that it cannot pass from me and I will drink it to the dregs,” imbedded in that commitment was the realization that the purpose of this suffering had nothing to do with me. I knew that there was no benefit (beyond insight) that I could possibly derive from this experience. It would not make me healthier, it would not give me any skills, it would not lastingly affect my body in any positive way. But there was One. There was one entirely other person that would derive lasting and eternal benefit from my suffering: My Child, my spiritual brother who was anxiously waiting to receive a body and come into this world. It had been made abundantly clear to me that suffering could not be separated from the process by which this child would receive his body. I didn’t know why the suffering had to be tied into it, but it was. Someone had to suffer, and he could not suffer it for himself. Recognizing this gave me renewed focus between my contractions. I did not want this pain. I would run away from it if I could, but if this pain is here, waiting for someone to suffer it so that this child may receive a body, then I volunteer. I volunteered with ever wave that wracked my body. I volunteered again and again, reminding myself as I whispered to the life in my womb, “For you. For you. It’s not about me. I will do this for you.”

As I prayed and cried and swayed and squatted my beautiful angel of a midwife was by my side every moment I wanted her. Countless times I leaned against her shoulder and she would softly whisper as she stroked my head, “It will take as long as it will take. It just takes as long as it’s gonna take.” I believe she was inspired in her comforting of me, because as I say it now, it seems unhelpful, but at the time it soothed everything. That one simple phrase spoke volumes of “I am here with you. I have seen this before. This has happened before. It will happen now. It is in the process. This is all the process. And this process will end. I promise that this process will end. And I will be with you all the way.” I don’t remember if I thought of it at the time, but I cannot remember the situation now without recalling every painting I have seen of Christ suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane during the time when the Father removed his Spirit and he was left alone within himself, but an angel was sent to comfort him. That angel was my midwife. And I was the one left utterly alone in my suffering.

It never made sense to me before what use an angel would be to the suffering Christ. It could not take the pain away. That would not be possible. Then why was it there? The Father was not there in person, but the angel was a symbol, a representation that the Father was aware and all knowing about the situation. The physical (or spiritual, probably) presence of the angel was a very real reminder and comfort that He (Christ) was not alone in the process. Although he was alone in the suffering, he was not alone in the process. What he was enduring was a process. He was in the process, and eventually the process would end. I don’t really know how He did feel, or what He did think, but I know that I now understand, to some degree, how an angel in times of unmitigated suffering can be a succor. My angel could not relieve my pain in any way, but she was an anchor that kept me reminded of the larger picture that included my suffering. A reminder that this suffering was not the whole picture, as it tried to convince me it was.

The Story of Rhys--The End

The evening wore on, approaching midnight. There was still just a stubborn lip of cervix impeding the baby’s progress. The midwife would check every couple of hours and tell me that it was a little softer, or a little thinner, but hour after hour, endlessly, it was still there. I still hadn’t really felt anything I recognized as a need to push, either. At some point earlier in the evening I sort of felt like maybe pushing sounded like a good idea, but I wasn’t even sure what it would mean, because my body wasn’t telling it to me, just my mind. I had tried pushing as the midwife tucked the lip out of the way (an extremely awkward arrangement), but it just pulled down with the baby’s head, so we gave up on that for the time.

Finally, at some point late, late in the evening, maybe even after midnight, the third midwife came. At this point I was completely shut off from all sense and reason by each contraction, letting my body do whatever it wanted to ameliorate the pain to the greatest degree possible (which was usually rocking while on my knees, but sometimes standing and squatting vigorously up and down to distract myself). I was slowly beginning to feel the need to go to the bathroom again, but this time a #2. I felt it there, but it didn’t want to come out. I went a couple of times to the bathroom to sit and wait to feel it descend to the point that I could push it out, but it never did. Finally I gave up on getting it out before the baby came and decided it would just have to come out at the same time. (I didn’t realize until way after the fact that it was the baby. I will have to remember that sensation for next time.)

The third midwife had brought with her a birthing stool. It was low and horse-shoe shaped, about 8 or 12 inches off the ground. It would provide support if you sat on it in a deep squat. We decided to try it and this third midwife (who was the oldest and most experienced of the three) sat on the edge of the bed and I sat in front of her on the stool. I was able to lean back against her for support and was cradled between her knees. I’m not sure where my husband was at this point, but I heard later that they had sent him to the other room to get some rest.

As the first contraction hit while I was on the stool, all of the blindingly unbearable pain of sitting during the contraction overwhelmed me and I stood up to run away. The midwife behind me literally grabbed me and forced me back down on to the stool. She whispered to me, “Let the pressure go all the way down.” Hearing through my pain-blurred senses, all I could assume was that this was an instruction of how make the hurting stop without standing up. I focused all the energy I could muster into imagining the entire force of the contraction concentrated at the top of my womb and slowly falling down, off, out the bottom.

I imagined this over and over, blocking everything else out—the pain, my surroundings, the people in the room—until the contraction had passed. I dealt with contraction after contraction like this, squeezing the midwife’s hands and pushing back into her, grasping at this visualization as my only hope of staying put during each wave of pain. I know at some point Kevin came back in the room, and I vaguely thought that he should be sitting behind me to help me, but I didn’t suggest it and I didn’t really want it because the experienced midwife that was there was doing such a good job.

Finally as I caught my breath between contractions I stopped to ask my midwife, who was on her knees down between my feet, “Should I be pushing now?” She laughed as she looked up at me and smiled, “Honey, that’s what you’ve been doing.” I was dumbstruck. I had no idea that what that was. In fact, the last I knew there was still a lip of cervix that wouldn’t let the baby’s head come through. But apparently the position my body was brought into by the birthing stool was exactly what I needed to open up the right way. After that, dealing with the contractions was easier. As I focused on the baby coming, coming, closer and closer, I don’t know if the pain of each contraction lessened, but I noticed it less. My midwife knelt in front of me massaging my perineum and vagina with oil while midwife #2 held a flashlight in the darkened room.

Finally they said there way a patch of hair showing and they invited me to feel it. Everything down there felt equally slimy and hairy to me, so I couldn’t tell what was what. The adjusted a tall a mirror that was in the room so I could see the area and I was shocked and excited by the dark black patch in the middle of all the red (I am a redhead).

Progress in pushing was very slow, but came steadily. No one remembers what time I started pushing (I don’t even remember starting to push), but at about 1:30 am, nearly 2 full days after the onset of labor, I pushed that little head all the way out (I was finally into it by that point). I stopped pushing as the contraction ended and his head was fully out, but he just kept coming without my help and slipped right out into my midwife’s hands.

They wrapped him in a clean towel and laid him on my bare belly. I didn’t notice the afterbirth because the pain in my back stopped as soon as he came out, and by comparison everything else was negligible. When it did come, they wrapped the placenta in an absorbent bed-liner pad and tucked it inside the towel with the baby. They let me snuggle my son as long as I wanted. All I can remember as I continued leaning back against the midwife with my husband close by, taking pictures, was whispering over and over to my son, “I’m not having a contraction. I’m not going to have another contraction,” with near delirious pleasure. It was the best news I could think of to share with him at the time.

The Story of Rhys--The Wrap-Up

We tried to nurse a little and he latched on and sucked like a champ, but quickly lost interest. At some point they did the apgar tests, but he was soon back with me. At some point, probably 30-60 minutes later, the cord was clamped and cut and the placenta discarded. I put on a warmer nightgown. I finally got to lay in bed and rest. We both slept. And no more contractions.

It was a few hours later that I woke up and went to the bathroom, with help. At every point where over the last day I had had to stop to wait through a contraction—on the way to the bathroom, while sitting on the toilet, while washing my hands, and on the way back to the bedroom—I found myself grinning uncontrollably and thinking, or more often saying out loud, “I’m not having a contraction.” Every time I grabbed 2 Rolos from the bowl and unwrapped one I would grin and proclaim as I unwrapped and popped in the other, “I’m not having a contraction!” That single thought dominated much of my mind over the entire day.

Most of the rest of my mind was taken up by this new little man in my life. Introducing him to his older sister was a joy. My parents brought her by that morning. She stayed with us for the rest of the time that we were there. My husband was wonderful in everything. I was instructed to lay in bed (except for going to the bathroom) for the entire next 2 days, preferably 3. It was really hard, but I did my best. I ate a lot and slept a lot and unashamedly took tons of ibuprofen for the afterpains. While I waited, much of the time alone with my son, for people to come visit me the lovely basement room I was so grateful for started to feel a little bit like a dungeon. I was beginning to crave daylight and a bit of bustle (just to observe, of course, not to manage). We did have some visitors, and I was very grateful. And I was so well tended by my hostess I thought about coming back to Utah for future births just so she could take care of me. When we finally left a few days later our son had a name—Rhys Morgan

Not Pregnant and Other Disconnected Thoughts

OK, I'm not pregnant, and I'm still not pregnant, and I'm still not pregnant.
I still have occasional thoughts of somehow magically discovering I actualy have been pregnant this whole last month, even though nothing suggests it and several things confirm the contrary (namely normal mentrual cycles and temperature shifts), but they seem as absurd as when I would think about being pregnant before I was married and would have to actively remind myself that there was and will be only one immaculate conception in the history of this world. (OK, I know I just misused that term--it actually refers to the conception of Mary, not of her Son--but couldn't think of a similarly succinct and definitive phrase for that one and I knew that people would know what I meant with less room for equivocation than if I just said "virgin birth," because, throught the miracles of modern technology, even that is not wholly uncommon. The End.)

After I was first self-diagnosed, I used to think that my hypopregnia started after I got married. But after a while of thinking about it, I started to remember that I would have random and illogical thoughts on the topic before it was ever humanly possible. So, well, that just goes to show that at least I am consistent.

I think there must be a reason and a plan for me not being pregnant right now. I don't know what it is yet, but someday I will, I'm sure. My most recent thoughts have been, "If I get pregnant the day before Halloween, I will be due on my birthday. That's cool." And that contents me enough not to feel too anxious about being pregnant (or not, as the case is) right now or in the immediate future. (I don't know when Kevin is coming home.)

But I do long for a little body growing inside of me. I long for a growing family, too. I want to know all of my children. I want to know who they are, what their names are, what they are like, what they look like, when they will come. But I don't actually want to know when they will come before they get here, or even how many of them there are. I want to be surprized. I just want to be surprized soon. Sometime. Soon.